One of the desirable aspects of boating involves practicing various different activities while being towed behind the boat and planing on the surface of the water through some form of towable water planing apparatus. While such activity originally was restricted primarily to water skiing, numerous other activities have gained popularity which are practiced while being towed behind a boat. Such activities include knee boarding, where a user kneels upon a board and is towed behind the boat with a standard tow rope; tubing, where a user rides upon an air-filled inner tube or other inflatable structure which planes upon the surface of the water while being connected to the boat either directly or through hands of the user; and more recently, wakeboarding. With wakeboarding, the user typically has both feet secured to a relatively wide board (i.e. greater than one foot wide) and with the user towed by a boat at typically a slower speed than is involved with water skiing. One activity enjoyed by a wakeboarder is traversing the wake of the boat and becoming airborne.
Numerous apparatuses have been developed to enhance the height and duration of jumps enjoyed by a wakeboarder. Such devices include devices to enhance a size of the wake, so that a greater amount of lifting force can be generated by the user riding up over the wake. Other devices involve towers or poles to cause a tow rope to be suspended from a higher point so that towing forces from the boat have a substantial lifting component acting upon the user. With the utilization of such devices, an accomplished wakeboarder can perform numerous tricks including flips, spins, and other enjoyable activities.
Unfortunately, even with the best of wake size conditions and pole or tower arrangements, jumps experienced by wakeboard users are still relatively limited in height and duration. Thus, these desirable jumps are limited to only a small portion of the overall wakeboarding experience. Accordingly, a need exists for systems for further enhancing height and duration of jumps which can be experienced by a wakeboarder. Such systems could optionally be enjoyed not only by wakeboarders, but also by users of water skis, knee boards, inner tubes, or other water surface planing apparatuses, as well as users of snowboards or skiers on snow who jump over snow ramps, either with or without being towed by a vehicle.
One sport which provides an extreme level of elevation while being towed behind a boat is the sport of parasailing. With parasailing, a modified parachute, called a parasail, is deployed behind a boat with the parasail riding above and to the rear of the boat due to a combination of lift and drag forces exerted upon the parasail. A cord extending between the parasail and the boat has a midpoint thereon where a user or group of users are located. The user or group of users are either wearing a harness or supported within some form of platform which is coupled to this cord, or otherwise coupled to both the parasail and the boat so that the parasail and boat are always secured to each other.
Parasailing is unique from wakeboarding and other water sports enjoyed behind a motorboat in that the user does not plane upon the surface. Also, the user does not exercise any control, with all control being employed by the driver of the boat and any other personnel controlling a length of the cord extending from the boat to the parasail. Reducing the size of a parasail, or a speed of the boat so that a user would ride upon the surface is not a practical solution. If a user were to fall, the user would have no way of releasing from the boat, and would experience undesirable dragging through the water until the driver of the boat realized that the user had fallen. Hence, while parasail configurations provide an enjoyable activity of their own, such parasail devices are distinct from other boat towed activities which involve the user borne upon a water planing apparatus where the user exhibits a significant level of control over the activity.